The View from § 2605(g) : RESPA's Causation Condition

Over the course of its multi-decade existence, the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act ("RESPA") has been amended to cover many diverse yet related “real estate” subjects. In its present iteration, two provisions — sections 2605(g) and 2609 — deal with mortgage escrow accounts, with much of RESPA's escrow-themed jurisprudence centering on section 2605(g). In spite of these precedents' sparsity, their perusal lays bare both the slow emergence and the steady consolidation of an oft-overlooked view of this narrowly tailored subsection: according to more and more of this nation's federal courts, section 2605(f) impliedly requires a showing of pecuniary damages in order to state a claim under section 2605(g) even “[]though . . . section [2605(f)] does not explicitly set this out as a pleading standard.” As a result of this extrapolation, a new weapon for use by the many subject to RESPA's positive commands and plain prohibitions has been forged, a valuable parry to even the most lurid allegations of liability.Over the course of its multi-decade existence, the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act (RESPA) has been amended to cover many diverse yet related “real estate” subjects. In its present iteration, two provisions — sections 2605(g) and 2609 — deal with mortgage escrow accounts, with much of RESPA's escrow-themed jurisprudence centering on section 2605(g). In spite of these precedents' sparsity, their perusal lays bare both the slow emergence and the steady consolidation of an oft-overlooked view of this narrowly tailored subsection: according to more and more of this nation's federal courts, section 2605(f) impliedly requires a showing of pecuniary damages in order to state a claim under section 2605(g) even “[]though . . . section [2605(f)] does not explicitly set this out as a pleading standard.” As a result of this extrapolation, a new weapon for use by the many subject to RESPA's positive commands and plain prohibitions has been forged, a valuable parry to even the most lurid allegations of liability.Having elicited favorable comments from practitioners and courts, this article provides a summary of this oft-ignored legal field